Researchers have suggested that babies born prematurely or severe underweight could grow up to be introvert, neurotic, and risk averse as adults, and this personality profile, they say, may help explain why adults in this group experience more career and relationship difficulties in their life.
Researchers wanted to find out if there was a distinct personality profile linked to extreme prematurity/low birthweight, and if lower IQ–which is associated with very early birth– explained any personality differences. Published in the Archives of Disease in Childhood (Fetal & Neonatal Edition), the research describes very premature birth at less than 32 weeks and/or very low birth weight of less than 1500 g.
For the study, researchers compared the personality traits of 200 26 year olds who had been born very prematurely and/or severely underweight with those of 197 young people who had been born at term and within the normal weight range.
Researchers assessed personality traits across five dimensions: introversion; neuroticism (tenseness and anxiety); levels of openness to new experiences; agreeableness; and conscientiousness.
The analysis revealed that adults who had been born very prematurely and/or extremely underweight scored significantly higher on all but two of the personality traits–conscientiousness and openness–than their peers born at term.
Researchers adjusted for potentially influential risk factors, but the magnitude of these differences didn’t change.
The analysis also found that adults who had been born very prematurely and/or extremely underweight also reported significantly higher levels of autistic spectrum behaviours, introversion, neuroticism, agreeableness and lower levels of risk taking.
The personality traits that best described the profile of adults who had been born very prematurely and/or extremely underweight were: introversion, risk aversion, autistic spectrum behaviours and neuroticism. The findings held true even after taking lower intelligence into account.
This cluster of traits describes a ‘socially withdrawn personality,’ or someone who is easily worried, less socially engaged, less interested in risk taking, and less communicative, say the researchers.
“The higher scores of [very premature/low birthweight] adults on the socially withdrawn scale are most likely to be the result of alterations in their brain structure and functioning due to the amalgam of changes in brain development related to premature birth and prenatal and neonatal insult,” write the researchers.
They go on to suggest that these children are likely to be exposed to considerable stressors in neonatal intensive care, which may affect brain development and adult adaptation, added to which early birth may prompt parents to be over protective.
The physiological circumstances of these babies’ birth might help explain the higher rates of career and relationship difficulties in adulthood, say the researchers.
The evidence shows that many adults born very premature/low birthweight are less likely to go on to higher education or get well paid jobs; and they find it harder to make friends, find long term partners, and become a parent, the researchers point out.
